Choose the right Accounts package for your business
As an accounting system provider, we are often asked “what is the most important feature to look for when evaluating accounting software?”
In our opinion, the development capability of the package is the prime feature to consider.
Accounting software publishers generally follow a strategy of producing software that contains all of the most popular and widely used features straight out of the box.
These products are designed to meet 80% to 85% of the needs of all businesses; thereafter, the software authors expect customers and their supporting dealers to use the product’s in-built development tools to add functionality to the product, thus fulfilling the remainder of the client’s needs.
This approach has worked well since the early 1980s when Sage released the first truly amendable system “Sage Sovereign”, later to become Line 100. All of the major accounting software publishers now adopt this approach as it allows their products to have wider appeal across multiple industry sectors.
In the eighties, the most successful accounting software products required the supporting dealer to modify the source code in order to add additional fields, calculations, and further functionality. This approach had several drawbacks. Modifying source code often required many months of programming which carried large cost implications.
Customers who had their source code modified often found that doing so prevented them from upgrading to new versions of the software as source code changes left no way to upgrade without losing all of the expensive development work.
As publishers released new versions of the accounting software, their customers were unable to upgrade effectively freezing the functionality of the product. In contrast, today’s development tools are easier to use and in most cases they allow the customers to upgrade to new product releases whilst retaining the developed features along the way.
A system’s ability to allow development is not just an incidental benefit today, it is part of an overall strategy to deliver solid accounting systems which contain the core features used by most businesses, twinned with development tools that allow developers to tailor the system to meet more fully, their client’s needs. This approach enables software companies to keep the core accounting system clean and lean; and avoids building confusion into the software. If you are in the market for an accounting software solution, you would be wise to evaluate the software’s development capabilities before making your selection.
Steve Garrett: : Client Account Manager
